


In Search Of Ordinary Dreams

by HalfshellVenus



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-01-11
Updated: 2014-01-11
Packaged: 2018-01-08 08:14:06
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 590
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1130347
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/HalfshellVenus/pseuds/HalfshellVenus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>(Season One): Sam's nightmares find solace.</p>
            </blockquote>





	In Search Of Ordinary Dreams

x-x-x-x-x

_It’s sprinkling, and Sam feels the wetness on his face. The sky is too dark to see clouds, but he knows that feeling well._

_Suddenly, the rain seems thick—sticky even—and there is a burning smell in the air. He looks right, left and still sees nothing. There is no sign of fire, no evidence of trouble. When he looks up again, it is no longer dark. She is there—Jess-- suspended above him and consumed by flames. Her blood drips down on him. Her eyes are dead and black, but seem to accuse him all the same. Sam opens his mouth to yell, but no sound comes out. He tries harder. And harder, putting all the force of his lungs behind it—_

“Sam! Sammy, wake up!” Dean is shaking his shoulder as Sam thrashes up out of the nightmare. How can they be so fresh, so _real,_ when they keep repeating over and over? How can anything so familiar still be so vivid? So frightening?

He lets out a sigh of pained relief. He can’t change the reality… but he’s no longer reliving it right this moment.

Dean climbs into bed behind him, burrowing under the covers. He rubs Sam’s back slowly, clumsily, not fully awake himself. Sam feels his panic ebbing away as the edges of the dream scatter into the reality of the moonlit hotel room. The ceiling is just a ceiling. It is as empty and harmless as it should be. He wriggles back against Dean, and just lies there, feeling the comfort of his warmth. Dean’s rubbing slows, his arm sliding onto the bed lifeless, and then he jerks awake again a second later. He wraps his arm around Sam’s stomach, nuzzling into him and already nearly asleep.

Sam puts his hand over Dean’s, holding it close against him. Holding it like an anchor against an unforgiving sea.

This is where he always felt safe—at night, curled up next to Dean.

Not during the daytime, where he saw too many things that a child should never see. His father refused to leave him behind on their missions, too worried for Sam’s safety to let him get too far away. But as a result, corpses and ghouls and wraiths had become part of his childhood reality. _No six-year-old should know the proper way to stake a vampire,_ he thought. _Or the sound it makes when it dies._

His father kept him alive… but took his innocence in doing it.

Daytime could be frightening, even unbearable. At night, though, they were rarely visited. He never really knew why. Maybe with the wards and the charms and the spells—and the constant moving from place to place— it was just possible that seeking out and attacking their family had been more trouble than it was worth.

He still feels safe now, in the dark, with Dean here to protect him. This was the part of his childhood that was predictable, that actually worked.

Wrapped in Dean’s arms, Sam begins to drift again.

_He is standing by a lake, on a brilliant, sunny day. Nothing rises from its depths. There is no nearby forest with dark and hungry things waiting to approach._

_It is just a lake, beautiful and peaceful with ripples brushing across the surface and waves lapping at the edges. It is simple and quiet, the water clear and blue, and he gazes at the grassy banks in unhurried calm. A breeze forms, wafting across the surface._

_He thinks it smells like summer…_

_\----- fin -----_  


End file.
